Arsenal stolen from BR hotel parking lot

BATON ROUGE- Thousands of dollars worth of high-powered ammunition and other munitions were stolen from a truck in a hotel parking lot over the weekend.

Hundreds of rounds of ammunition, Glock pistol clips, clear-out grenades and a bulletproof vest were taken. The burglary was reported on Sunday afternoon at the Crowne Plaza Hotel off of Constitution Avenue.

"Why somebody would need that type of fire power for any reason unless he was going to war, I just can't imagine someone having that much," Former Baton Rouge Police Chief Pat Englade said.

The WBRZ Investigative Unit has learned the man who had his car broken into was hired by a hotel guest as a security guard. He worked for Falcon Security out of New Orleans. The company told WBRZ it was an unarmed detail and much of the equipment belonged to the security guard.

"Apparently, he was locked and loaded for anything going to happen," Englade said. "I can't imagine what he would be doing with that arsenal myself. Most police departments don't have that kind of weaponry and ammunition with them."

Hotel leaders and the Baton Rouge Police Department declined to do an on camera interview, but said the investigation is ongoing.

Following a weekend of deadly violence, concern is mounting over who has the high powered artillery.

"If this guy is military trained and he knew what he was doing, with those weapons and he felt comfortable with them, certainly there's no law against him carrying them, but the problem is, he's not carrying them. Someone else is. There lies the problem," Englade said.

Right now, it appears the security guard was targeted since no other cars in the parking lot were burglarized. Investigators are in the process of checking surveillance cameras to see if that can lead to any clues.